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The first four commandments of the law teach us how to love God, even how to love Him in worship on the day of His choosing. It is important for us to understand the fourth commandment, in which God gives His command for the day of His worship: "Remember the ...
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Today we come to the second-to-last section from John Gerstner's The Problem of Pleasure. He has already written of The Non-Problem of Pain, he has shown that The Real Problem is Pleasure, he has suggested Why Pain is Not the Problem and has answered the question Why Do the “Righteous” Suffer? In this article he asks, "Why does God permit pleasure?"
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Reformed Christians are sometimes accused of being cold and callous, people who are Christian stoics or even fatalists. We are, to some, "the frozen chosen." In this article from the August issue of Tabletalk, Keith Mathison suggests that we may have earned this unfortunate nickname. He takes grief as an example of an area in which we may lack biblical balance, unintentionally offending others as we allow our sense of God's sovereignty to trump our understanding of the reality that death is an unnatural state. He goes on to encourage Christians to grieve well. "Here and now, we grieve with those who grieve, not as unbelievers with no hope of the resurrection, but as believers who know death cannot defeat us, but who still hate this enemy of God and the pain and loneliness it causes to our brothers and sisters. We grieve as those who cannot wait to see death destroyed once and for all."
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This article continues Dr. Gerstner’s look at The Problem of Pleasure. Here he answers the age-old question "Why do the 'righteous' suffer?" He concludes that "in spite of all the intellectual agonizing about the problem of pain, the only problem is explaining why pain is a problem. In a sinful world pain is axiomatic." It is the absence of pain that would prove a real problem for those who honestly seek answers. The better question, one formed in light of God's revelation is this: "Why is there so little pain and suffering?" Keep Reading

New updates and features are now available for the free Ligonier App for iPhone and iPod Touch. With the Ligonier App, you can listen to or watch broadcast archives, read a daily Bible devotional, and enjoy thousands of free messages, articles, and devotionals. The updated features include background audio, fast app switching, advanced audio download, and more.
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Writing in 1539, John Calvin described Martin Bucer as a man “who on account of his profound scholarship, his bounteous knowledge about a wide range of subjects, his keen mind, his wide reading, and many other different virtues, remains unsurpassed today by anyone, can be compared with only a few, and excels the vast majority.” Calvin wrote these words during his three year stay in Strasbourg (1538–1541), where Bucer was a prominent Reformer. After his arrival in the city, Calvin lived for a time in Bucer’s house before moving into a house with a back yard that abutted Bucer’s back yard. During this time the two Reformers became close, and Bucer greatly influenced his younger colleague. Yet in spite of the close connection between Bucer and Calvin, Bucer remains something of an unknown for many Reformed Christians, relegated to the role of a secondary Reformer.
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Collin Hansen has a word for older believers. Asking you to overlook the pride of younger Christians, he asks you to do us one big favor: tell us your stories. "Your stories give us the perspective we haven’t yet gained with experience. We don’t yet understand how much we don’t know. Our youthful bluster masks insecurity. We stand tall against withering attacks from our peers, but we’ve hardly been tested. We fear that when harder times come our faith will prove ephemeral. But your stories gird us against these doubts. So look underneath our confident exterior. You’ll find that younger Christians actually want to hear from older believers about how God demonstrated His faithfulness in their generation." Keep reading to find how stories have influenced Collin, how they have led him to praise God for what he has done in the past, and how they have encouraged him to ask God to do great things in the future.
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“Don’t worry—be happy!” From popular music to a cultural slogan, this adage is stated in the form of an imperative. It reflects the idea that happiness can be evoked by an act of the will. Yet the prevailing assumption among us is that happiness is something that happens to us or in us. It is a passive experience. We may be active in seeking it, as its pursuit is considered to be an inalienable right of Americans. But the thing itself, as elusive as it may be, is often regarded as something involuntary.
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